My cycling month in review: March 2016

A new month is upon us and, as I always do at the beginning of a new month, this morning I’m going to review some of my cycling highlights, personal records and totals from the previous month.

March was not much of a bike month–just 603 miles. I’ve been putting in very long hours every day, and the past couple of weeks 16 hours work days have become my new normal. I have not had much time for riding, but I did manage to ride at least 10 miles every day and keep my riding streak alive (822 days as of yesterday). I do miss it, and am looking forward to the time when I can resume my usual riding schedule. Unfortunately that’s not going to happen for a least a few more weeks, however.

Before I get into all the numbers and details, here are my favorite photos of the month (see captions, click to enlarge):

I rode my trainer 3 or 4 times this month. Zwift’s new mountain climb is beautiful but TOUGH!!!

Unfortunately I was almost hit by a car this month. Please pay attention when you’re driving!

Total Riding Time, March 2016: 28h 28m (Current PR, set July 2015: 65h 50m)

Other Cycling Personal Records & Achievements

Over the past month I set a total of 89 cycling personal records for time on various Strava segments.

For Strava’s March 2016 Distance Challenge I rode more kilometers than 84.24% Strava Distance Challenge cyclists worldwide, placing 33,156 out of a total of 210,431 athletes with 859 kilometers ridden from March 1st – March 31st.

My Training Calendar: March 2016

My March 2016 Training Calendar

VeloViewer Score

I’ve been using the awesome Strava companion site VeloViewer for quite some time now (in fact, that’s where some of the stats and charts in these monthly reports are obtained). If you’re a Strava cyclist who craves even more ways to crunch your ride data, then you owe it to yourself to check out VeloViewer. There’s a lot there, so explore and have some fun.

One of the features of VeloViewer that I really like is its innovative and unique VeloViewer Score.

The VeloViewer Score is a cool way for Strava users to compare themselves against other cyclists: It is the average segment position score from a cyclist’s top 25% (up to a maximum of 100) non-downhill segments. What I like about the VeloViewer Score is that it’s derived based on an algorithm that actually weights the number of other athletes who have also ridden the segments. In other words, VeloViewer understands and takes into account that a KOM with only 20 cyclists on the leaderboard is nowhere near as impressive as a KOM with 1,000 cyclists on the leaderboard.

Because of the way the VeloViewer Score is computed, it’s a unique method for cyclists who live far apart and never ride the same segments to compare their overall performances.

Go create your own VeloViewer account and see how you stack up with your Strava friends across the globe! Note that as of November 2014 VeloViewer is no longer a free service. The cost, however, is only about $16.00 (USD) per year, and I feel its features are well worth what comes to a little over a buck a month.

2016 Distance, Elevation and Riding Time

I’ve spent a total of 120h 16m in the saddle so far in 2016. Average daily riding time is 1h 19m.

My riding streak continues, and I have now ridden my bike every single day for 822 days straight (at least one ride every day from December 31, 2013 forward). My minimum standards for this challenge are as follows:

The bare minimum for a ride, or rides, to count is 10 miles/16.1 kilometers.

Multiple rides on the same day that total in excess of 10 miles/16.1 kilometers are acceptable.

Indoor trainer rides (in excess of 10 miles) count.

Here are comparisons of my distance and elevation for 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016.

Distance comparison: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 YTD.

Here’s a zoomed in view that shows how 2016 YTD distance compares to years past at this point in the calendar (with the actual numbers):

John Stone Fitness Comments

Amazing that you can ride despite 16hr work schedule..I guess that proves there are no excuses for any of us to complain of time constraints. Thanks for the morivation over the years too – brilliant stuff.

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